Abdelhai Bennani Trio, The Crawling Snake, with Alan Silva, Makoto Sato

Tenor avantist Abdelhai Bennani has been rather prolific with releases on the JaZt Tapes label. I have covered a number of them and today we have another. It is a trio of Bennani, Alan Silva on digital keys and piano, and Makoto Sato on drums, which is a very potent threesome on this live date from Rennes, France. The album is called The Crawling Snake (JaZt Tapes CD 053).

It is a continuous 50 minute performance of the free jazz sort, as you may have imagined. Makoto Sato gives us his dynamo all-over drumming style, Alan Silva reminds us that he is an imaginative avant conceptualist whether on bass or on keyboards, and Abdelhai gives us a robust over-the-top tenor madness very much in keeping with his approach. Everyone gets in-your-face in very good ways here.

With the recent demise of Bernard Stollman, founder of ESP Disks, we are reminded of how the legacy of the visionary artists who first recorded for that label lives on with a recording like this. It is an updated "new thing" we hear on The Crawling Snake, surely. And it sounds to me as fresh as ever. Alan Silva was one of the breakthrough artists of course in those early New York days. And he continues to thrive as evidenced by this recording, with Bennani and Sato giving us very vibrant fellow-artists for a pleasingly out excursion.

For further info and to find out how to order, go the the JaZt Tapes site: http://www.janstrom.se/7.-jazt-tapes-15468036

This is "free jazz" the way it sounds when everybody is attuned to the spirit feel. Recommended!